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Farm Frolics
Farm Frolics is a 1941 Warner Bros. cartoon in the Merrie Melodies series. It was directed by Bob Clampett, animation by Rod Scribner, and musical direction by Carl Stalling. The vocal group heard at the beginning is the Sportsmen Quartet, who often harmonized in Warner Bros. cartoons of the period, later becoming the resident singing group on Jack Benny's radio and TV shows. It is also on 50 Classic Cartoons Volume 3. Plot synopsis The cartoon starts with the arm of an animator drawing a farm scene. The farm scene then colors itself, and the camera zooms in just as the plot follows: *A realistic-looking horse is seen, whinnying (courtesy of Mel Blanc), and a comic triple plays out: The narrator asks the horse to do a trot; the horse obliges. The narrator asks for a gallop; the horse again obliges. The narrator then asks the horse to do a "canter". The horse turns from realistic to a cartoon horse, with the bugged eyes of, and singing "I'm Happy About the Whole Thing" (by Harry Warren and Johnny Mercer) in the style of, the vaudeville star [[Eddie Cantor|Eddie Cantor]], vocally impersonated by Kent Rogers. The narrator admonishes the horse, which grins sheepishly. *The family dog is seen lazing on the porch, springing to alertness when the newspaper arrives. The dog makes a mad dash to the end of the driveway, gets the paper, comes back to the porch, and immediately starts to read the paper himself, starting with the Sunday comics. He turns to the audience, and says, "I can hardly wait to see what happened to Dick Tracy!" (This gag would be used by Clampett again in The Great Piggy Bank Robbery.) *A hen leaves her eggs unguarded, and a mean-looking weasel stealthily creeps into the henhouse while the narrator frets. Just as he is about to grab the eggs, they all hatch at once, and the chicks shout "BOO!" in unison. The frightened weasel evokes a Joe Penner catch-phrase, "Don't ever DOOO that!" and gasps as his heart pounds. *An owl is hooting dully until it briefly smiles while saying "Who's Yehoodi?" *A few birds put a little twig, a bit of string, and piece of straw until they make a house approved by the Federal Housing Administration, singing, "There's no place like home!" *A worried field mouse with huge ears is asked about what worries him; he claims "I don't know, Doc. I...I just keep hearing things." *A group of ants is seen coming and going at an anthill. The camera and mike zoom in to allow the viewer to see and hear as a mother summons her son: "Hen-REEEE!" "Coming, Mother!" (referring to the catchphrase from the radio show, "The Aldrich Family"). *A mouse mentions that he is kind to the cat against which he is snuggling, and nods with the narrator's observation that they are friends. When asked by the narrator if he has anything he would like to say to his friends in the audience, the mouse yells, "GET ME OUT OF HEEEEEEEEERE!!!!!!!!!", then escapes. A brief circle-around chase ensues, then ends with the cat catching the mouse, then returning to the snuggling. The mouse shrugs. *A recurring gag, it has six piglets eagerly watching an alarm clock. When it finally hits 6:00 pm, one of the pigs yells "Dinnertime!" and they dash off to their mother, to the tune of the military bugle call "Mess Call". She braces for the onslaught as the sucklings pile into her side. Zooming in on the mother pig's rather dejected face, she speaks to the audience in the manner of ZaSu Pitts: "Oh, dear... every day, it's the same thing!" Iris-out. History This is one of the cartoons that Warner would occasionally produce that featured none of its stable of characters, just a series of gags, usually based on outrageous stereotypes and plays on words, and topical references, as a narrator (Robert C. Bruce) describes the action. The dog was spotted in 1988's Who Framed Roger Rabbit toward the final scene. See also * Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1940–1949) * Looney Tunes Golden Collection Gallery References External links * Category:Merrie Melodies shorts Category:Merrie Melodies Category:Blue Ribbon Category:Blue Ribbon shorts Category:One-shot shorts Category:One-shots Category:One-shot films Category:Directed by Bob Clampett Category:Story by Warren Foster Category:Written by Warren Foster Category:Animation by John Cary Category:Animation by I. Ellis Category:Animated by I. Ellies Category:Music by Carl Stalling Category:Musical Direction by Carl W. Stalling Category:Musical Direction by Carl Stalling Category:1941 films Category:1941 shorts Category:1941 Category:1940s shorts Category:1940s films Category:1940s Category:Cartoons directed by Bob Clampett Category:Leon Schlesinger Studios Category:Produced by Leon Schlesinger Category:Leon Schlesinger Productions Category:Cartoons produced by Leon Schlesinger Category:Cartoons written by Warren Foster Category:Cartoons animated by John Carey Category:Cartoons animated by I. Ellis Category:Animated by I. Ellis Category:Cartoons with music by Carl W. Stalling Category:Music by Carl W. Stalling Category:Cartoons with music by Carl Stalling Category:Film Editing by Treg Brown Category:Cartoons with sound effects by Treg Brown Category:Narrated by Robert C. Bruce Category:Narration by Robert C. Bruce Category:Looney Tunes Category:Looney Tunes shorts Category:Vitaphone short films Category:Warner Bros. Animation Category:Warner Bros. 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